Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Groundhog Day

If ever a microcosm for the last month of baseball was needed, simply look to the 2 hours of Tuesday night as the Tribe dropped the first game of the series to Detroit:
Great Pitching + Zero Offense = Another Frustrating Outcome.

Fausto was tremendous, outstanding, marvelous, superb, masterful, phenomenal, and on and on and on. The superlatives don’t do justice to an 8-inning, 77 pitch, 3 hit, no walk, and 5 strikeout performance put up by the Faustastic One.

Carmona has a 1.80 ERA since the All-Star Break, and has gone 4-4!
The problem, obviously, is that Fausto is not the only getting burned by getting no offensive support. The dreadful approach (can it really be called an approach?) resulted again in few hard hit balls, many strikeouts, and me banging my head against the wall.

The widespread disease of swinging splinters has gone beyond epidemic as we’ve reached the point that I’d like to head into the Tribe clubhouse in one of those big yellow biohazard suits, put all of the Indians’ bats in a big box, and simply cart them out of the room…all without saying a word.

The Indians mustered one hit against a pitcher two starts removed from a AA pitcher and showed the same awful at-bats that have become the norm, not the exception.

No patience at the plate…
Trying to tie the game with one swing…
Not working the count…
Poor pitch recognition and selection…

At this point, it seems that Wedge could make the lineup card out on a dartboard and the result might be better.
If there was ever a night to tear things apart, it is tonight.

Flip the table, Eric.
Put the post-game spread on the floor.
Wake these guys up...NOW.

If you’re not willing to do it, maybe someone should check Jim Mora’s availability.

5 comments:

t-bone said...

urgh.

Cy Slapnicka said...

Wedge and the vets are like guys playing violins on the deck as the titanic went down. People flying by, life rafts being lowered....and they decide to sit and play the violin as if nothing is happening. i know i'm not the only one that doesn't get it. i'm not one of the people that regularly calls for wedge's head, but i'd kill for a bobby cox or lou pinella right now to just....go....BANANAS!

Hyde said...

As much trouble as the Indians have had scoring lately and as much as I've heard Wedge cite track records when explaining a lineup decision, it shocked me that Gutierrez did not play in this game after hitting a home run off Jurrjens last week.

I think you can really make a case that the Indians are headed for a fourth straight year of underachieving (and yes I include 2004 here--the Tribe had 5 All-Stars that year and finished with a losing record). I wish them luck trying to sell this team in 2008 with the playoff-less duo of Wedge and Shapiro as its public face.

Cy Slapnicka said...

Funny post on deadspin:
"apparently mike brown coaches offense for all of cleveland's teams"

rodells said...

Looks like we're revisiting 2005 earlier in the season.

The end result, World Series pitching that sits at home in October. We can't ask for much more from our arms. We need to HIT NOW!

Nice post about Gutierrez not playing last night. Tack that onto the Wedge list. Nixon sure has alot of big hits this year...